THE LOST BIRDS WITH VOCES8
Concert Hall, Queensland Performing Arts Centre
Saturday June 8 at 7:30 pm
It’s getting a bit difficult to keep track of who or what is playing with or under the auspices of the QSO. But it seems pretty clear that this fine British vocal octet is going to work through a mainly avian-favouring program with the orchestra. The night opens with Mendelssohn’s Hebrides Overture which has vague suggestions of sea birds – or does it? Then Jack Liebeck, Royal Academy professor and director of the Australian Festival of Chamber Music, takes the solo line in Vaughan Williams’ The Lark Ascending, But this will be in an arrangement format with the violinist supported by the vocal octet and the orchestra; you may well ask why. More regular fare comes with American writer Caroline Shaw‘s and the swallow which is a version of part of the opening verses to Psalm 84 for SSAATTBB choral forces, and very pretty it is, too, if brief. But the big offering is Christopher Tin‘s The Lost Birds, a 12-movement cantata about 45 minutes in length, written for chorus, harp, timpani, percussion and string orchestra, which memorializes specific birds facing extinction (if not already in that state). This exercise is a repetition of a LIVE from London broadcast of October 15 2022 but without the Mendelssohn. You can hear this for the customary $95 to $135 full price, depending on where you sit, with the usual concessions that can amount to a lot, but can also be trivial. No matter what you pay, you still get stung $7.20 for booking.
This program will be repeated almost intact on Sunday June 9 at 11:30 am. Only the Mendelssohn overture will be omitted. Attendance is cheaper this morning, ranging from $76 to $109 full price, but you still need to find $7.20 for putting your money down.
SING WITH VOCES 8
Queensland Symphony Orchestra Studio, South Bank
Monday June 10 at 6:30 pm
While they’re in town,. the members of VOCES8 are spreading the word for choral music and it’s a bit of an improvement on those wild-and-woolly pub congregations belting out crowd favourites. You can acquire the music in advance (it’s on the QSO website, if you’re after a sneak preview), and thereby you can prepare – or not. The promoters say, ‘No previous singing experience is required’, but I think that might make the 2 hours 30 minutes duration of this workshop an unpleasant experience for those choristers who show up expecting a bit of upper-level training. The group’s factotum, Paul Smith, will lead the session as the public and the British octet grapple with: Marta Keen‘s Homeward Bound which Smith has arranged for SATTB with extraordinary confidence in the plethora of tenors that will turn up; Grace by Bobby McFerrin, Yo-Yo Ma and Roger Treece in a simple SATB arrangement by Smith; Jonathan Dove/Alasdair Middleton‘s Music on the Waters gets the Smith treatment and starts with three treble clef voices that expand to five by the end in the most free-wheeling of the four pieces; and finally, the traditional tune Wayfaring Stranger which Smith eventually builds to another SATTB organization. You can enlist in this exercise for $65, and add on the $7.95 ‘transaction fee’ that the QSO slugs you with when left to its own devices.
2024 COMPOSE PROGRAM
Queensland Symphony Orchestra Studio
Saturday June 15 at 6:30 pm
This reminds me of the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra’s start-of-year Cybec 21st Century Australian Composers Program where a lucky few university-level applicants get to submit a new orchestral score for mentoring by a name composer, then performance in a January free-for-all, the best being chosen for inclusion in the Metropolis season later in the year. The QSO opts for secondary school composers and is giving space to 29 young writers: four from Brisbane Girls Grammar, four from Kenmore State High, three from Narangba Valley State High, three from Toowoomba Anglican, and the other 15 from individual schools (I suppose). Mentors for these hopefuls are QSO cellist Craig Allister Young and Griffith University’s Timothy Tate. Two conductors are involved: QSO violin Katie Betts and Nathaniel Griffiths from the Australian Conducting Academy. Ticket prices range from $20 to $39, which is a step up from Melbourne’s event which I think was free, thanks to the sponsor’s liberality. But you’re still liable for the QSO’s $7.95 impost which, if you’re a student, is getting close to being half the cost of your ticket. Can you really call this encouraging the young?
CHAMBER PLAYERS 2
Queensland Symphony Orchestra Studio
Sunday June 16 at 3 pm
Eight violins, a viola, a cello, a piano: that’s the oddly-shaped personnel for this Sunday afternoon outing for some members of the QSO. The program ends in orthodoxy with a string quartet by Fanny Mendelssohn: the only one extant from her mature years as a writer. I loved the fact that her brother disapproved of it but she didn’t change a note; God knows it’s more ardent than most of his efforts in the form. In front of this comes Australian writer Anne Cawrse‘s Songs Without Words, a piano trio in three movements – Ornamental, Lied, Swansong – that serves as a minor homage to the Mendelssohn siblings and to a certain extent echoes their language. But the entertainment begins with Andrew Norman‘s Gran Turismo of 2004. Written for eight violins, it takes its impetus from the racecar game, Baroque concerto grossi and Italian Futurism (Balla, Russolo, Marinetti and all the gang). The whole outpouring lasts for about 8 minutes and will feature Natsuko Yoshimoto, Alan Smith, Rebecca Seymour, Brenda Sullivan, Mia Stanton, Stephen Tooke, Sonia Wilson and Ann Holtzapffel. The viola and cello in Fanny’s piece will be Charlotte Burbrook de Vere and Kathryn Close respectively, and the pianist for Cawrse’s trios is Therese Milanovic. This event is scheduled to last for 1 hour 20 minutes without interval; I can see it lasting half that time, unless the players give us some really substantial introductory addresses. Tickets range from $35 for a child to $59 for a concession-less adult with the QSO’s typical add-on fee of $7. 95 for ludicrously over-priced book-keeping.
ALTSTAEDT PLAYS
Concert Hall, Queensland Performing Arts Centre
Monday June 17 at 7 pm
Haydn bookends this program, directed by guest and solo cellist with theatrically unruly hair, Nicolas Altstaedt. It’s the German/French musician’s debut with the ACO and he hasn’t spared himself by performing the highly popular Haydn Cello Concerto in C Major in a new (and probably necessary) arrangement for strings (obviating the original score’s demand to carry around pairs of oboes and horns on a national tour), as well as Tchaikovsky’s Rococo Variations (also in an all-strings version so that the pairs of flutes, oboes, clarinets, bassoons and horns in the original can disappear, leaving only the memory of their timbres behind). As for the other Haydn, we’re to hear selections from the Seven Last Words of Christ: that series of meditations originally written for orchestra, then cut down for string quartet, further curtailed for piano, finally appearing in a soloists/choral/orchestral version – all organized by the composer – but this is another arrangement, probably of the string quartet version. Moving abruptly to our times, Altstaedt leads another arrangement of Kurtag’s 1989 Officium breve in memoriam Andreae Szervanszky (the Hungarian composer whose first name was Endre); originally a string quartet, it holds 15 short movements, the whole lasting about 11/12 minutes. As well, the ACO revives the Four Transylvanian Dances of Sandor Veress (1944, 1949), actually composed for string orchestra, which the ensemble recorded back in 1995. In the only contemporary music on this night, Altstaedt takes his forces through Xenakis’ Aroura of 1971, another string orchestra original which will make a strange, unsettling interruption to this otherwise staid collection of works. Prices of tickets range from $25 to $150, with a ‘handling fee’ of $8.50, which is really getting up there if you’re angling for the cheapest seat available.
Concert Hall, Queensland Performing Arts Centre
Wednesday June 19 at 7 pm
This pianist is a well-known name in the virtuosic field, especially in the United States, of which country he is a citizen despite being born in Russia. Across his career, he has made a few odd repertoire choices, including the first recording of the original score to Tchaikovsky’s B flat minor Piano Concerto. This seems to be his first Musica Viva tour and may be his first time on these shores, for which occasion he has assembled a far-reaching, eclectic program. He is presenting two Chopin pieces: the A flat Major Polonaise-fantaisie which is packed with stops and starts and never seems to settle into a real dance; and the F minor Fantaisie which is a powerful and formally compact narrative. Both lie marginally outside the usual waltz/polonaise/etude/prelude/impromptu/scherzo/mazurka field that many other pianists plough – which is all to the good. Other off-centre gems include Liszt’s E Major Polonaise, Schumann’s Carnival of Vienna. Faure’s last nocturne, and the imperturbably fluid/spiky Three Intermezzi by Poulenc. The odd men out are a new Transcendental Etude by Australian composer Liza Lim, commissioned for this tour by Musica Viva; and a homage to the elder French composer in a Nocturne from the Apres Faure collection by American jazz pianist/composer/arranger Brad Mehldau. You can gain admission for between $15 and $115; I don’t know about any booking/purchase/handling fee.
BRAHMS & RACHMANINOV
Concert Hall, Queensland Performing Arts Centre
Friday June 21 at 11:30 am
What you see is what you get: two works, one each, by the named composers. The main element will be the Brahms Symphony No. 4 in E minor with its chaconne finale and as close to perfect as a final symphony gets for any composer. The conductor is Jaime Martin, currently chief conductor of the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra and apparently flourishing in the job. I’ve never seen him at work so know nothing about his handling of the standard repertoire. Alongside this splendour comes Rachmaninov’s Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini, neglected for several decades until its use in the 1953 romance trilogy film The Story of Three Loves where its 18th variation became a Hollywood trope for unfulfilled passion. This performance features soloist Denis Kozhukhin whose expertise was well demonstrated by his performance of all four Rachmaninov piano concerti at a Barcelona festival two years ago. I’ve not seen mention of his encounters with this rhapsody, but you should expect something informed and gripping. You can gain admission for between $76 and $109 full price, with the usual concessions available, and the inevitable $7.20 surcharge
This program will be repeated on Saturday June 22 at 7:30 pm, with the addition of Ravel’s Le Tombeau de Couperin for absolutely no reason I can think of. Here, you pay more – from $95 to $135 full price; Ravel doesn’t come cheap.
Concert Hall, Queensland Performing Arts Centre
Sunday June 23 at 3 pm
Brisbane’s well-loved near-native son is appearing under the Medici banner again. You’ll hear quite a few surprises in this program which begins with Bach’s French Suite No. 2 in C minor – which makes a change from hearing the regularly-trotted-out No 5 in G Major. Mind you, this is a rather dour work but can shine in the right hands. John Field’s Variations on a Russian folk song is an amiable enough creation, written in one continuous block and recently recorded by Lane for Hyperion. A better-known work follows with Mozart’s F Major Sonata K 332: three elegantly-shaped and good-humoured landscapes. A bracket of Chopin follows, beginning with the F minor Fantaisie that Kirill Gerstein is playing four days previous (see above); as well, Lane performs the A flat Etude that kicks off the Op. 25 set, plus the D flat Op. 28 Prelude. The recital’s formal program ends with Glazunov’s Theme and variations from 1900, apparently based on a Finnish folk tune. There are 15 variants, starting off sensibly enough but turning virtuosic in the later reaches; this also has been recorded by Lane, on the same disc as the Field variations mentioned above. Admission is $90, with a concession price of $80 available (big deal) and the atrocious QPAC booking fee of $7.20 tacked on.
DENIS KOZHUKHIN PIANO RECITAL
Queensland Symphony Orchestra Studio
Monday June 24 at 7:30 pm
Coming close on the heels of Piers Lane’s recital, Kozhukhin is playing a solo recital under the QSO’s auspices. Mind you, it’s not a lengthy event – scheduled to last 1 hour 10 minutes – but you get two big masterpieces for your time. The Russian-born pianist lays down the law with Schubert’s B flat Piano Sonata, the last one in the canon and a gripping saga from start to finish. As most performers view it, this sonata stands up as half a program in a full recital but tonight it is paired with the Liszt B minor Sonata, the model of four-part compression under the high Romantic banner and just 10 minutes shorter than the Schubert. It’s hard to se this pair sitting comfortably side by side, particularly when you consider the Hungarian writer’s tendency towards the flamboyant although this score is less glittering than many another in the composer’s output. Kozhukhin has played the B flat Sonata fairly recently, last year in Alicante, but the B minor score has not appeared on his recent recital content. You can hear this program for $35 if you’re a student or child, $79 full fee, and a brave $71 if you happen to have a concession card – big whoops. And never forget the obligatory $7.95 penalty.
Queensland Symphony Orchestra Studio
Thursday June 27 at 7:30 pm
You get to hear three substantial scores in this recital that will run for an uninterrupted 1 hour 20 minutes. The ensemble opens with what I expect will prove the most difficult to imbibe element: Beethoven No 12 in E flat – the first and least performed of the final group; of string quartets. It’s still a challenge for even expert ensembles, not least for its formal quirks and often unsettling nomadic quality (that meandering Adagio). And the ASQ ends with Korngold’s No. 2, also in E flat and written in 1933, just before he decamped to Hollywood and ‘real’ fame, This is a true rarity and I can’t remember hearing any performance live. Still, there’s always room for the composer of Die tote Stadt (which I’ve only experienced live in a concert performance at one of the early Brisbane Music Festivals) and the mellifluous Violin Concerto (that I last heard from the outstanding James Ehnes). Also, the ensemble is presenting Harry Sdraulig‘s new String Quartet No. 2, here enjoying its premiere by its commissioners on the ASQ’s national tour. I’m impressed by this young Australian’s works whenever they turn up and so have high hopes for this re-entry into a difficult form. Tickets are the same as for Kozhukhin’s recital above; same measly concession, same disadvantaging purchase fee.
O'Connell the Music 